Don’t look here, look here.
{as Gibbage is now defunct, I’ve retrieved the text and added it to this post – exciting eh?]
Blast Miner
Blast Miner isn’t a bad game, unfortunately just like the description seems to flounder to nail down what the game entails, so it follows that Blast Miner isn’t sure what type of game it actually is. Its as if someone has sat down and made a list of things that are really, really great in games right now, and next to each point they’ve drawn a little tick box in crayon and wont be satisfied until every single box is filled with ticks.
Physics? Check. Armadillo Run style stage set up? Check. Completing a level within a budget? Check. Block dropping? Check. Explosives? Check. Huge chunks of gold – check.
Game designers, when will you learn? You can’t possibly be everything to everyone without losing that something that will make your game special.
Special, like a cow at Christmas.
Thats the saddening thing about Blast Miner, each individual part of the game is highly polished and brimming with good idea’s but when viewed as a whole, they all fall short of the mark.
The graphics and presentation are fantastic, so much so that they almost disguise how awful the menu system is, the three game skins are well designed yet one is needlessly confusing replacing the symbolic blocks with chunks of colour, the physics are solid and a great idea but feel too floaty to be satisfying, and both the included game modes seem to be great idea’s in their own right let down with minor niggles.
Out of the two game modes, the puzzle mode is the more satisfying. Being able to set up the stage and let rip a huge chain of explosions propelling your blocks to the finishing line is a rewarding experience. The designs are fiendish at times, occasionally confusing, but this is a puzzle mode and you’d expect nothing less.
Its the arcade mode that really lets the side down. You never really feel like you have any control over what happens on the screen. Rotating the blocks becomes a chore due to the floaty physics, launching the gold into the machine feels more a matter of blind luck than skill no matter how large an explosion you cause and the small play area stifles any truly creative play. Even watching the online replays, you’ll still be left feeling none the wiser as to how to score big.
If you can pretend the arcade mode doesn’t exist and learn to cope with the curiously drifting physics in puzzle mode, then there’s a good chance that you’ll find a lot of love in Blast Miner. I just can’t shake the feeling that with a little bit more focus, more concentration on what the game does well and a whole lot less emphasis on just ticking the boxes of whats good and great in games – Blast Miner could have been something very special indeed.
As it stands, its a flawed gem that on one hand should be applauded for being so defiantly indie in its approach, and on the other, taken outside and given a kicking for being so defiantly indie in its approach.
A surefire case of try before you buy.